


'Twas The Night Before Zombies

by GreenGoth



Series: The Monrosalee Chronicles [2]
Category: Grimm (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-02
Updated: 2018-04-02
Packaged: 2019-04-17 02:05:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14178180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreenGoth/pseuds/GreenGoth
Summary: This is my imagining of what went on behind the scenes between Monroe and Rosalee leading up to and including their first night as lovers, and the morning after.Inspired by the events in the end of Season 2 episodes "Kiss of the Muse", "The Waking Dead" and "Good Night, Sweet Grimm" and in two delightful deleted scenes on their DVD,  I've included actions and dialogue from essential scenes on the show where necessary to keep the timeline clear...which of course along with everything related to the creation of and legal rights to the Grimm TV show, do not belong to me.  Only my obsessive love of "Grimm" belongs to me!





	'Twas The Night Before Zombies

**Author's Note:**

> There are fairly graphic erotic scenes in the story (it is about their first night together, after all!) and discussion of Rosalee's and Monroe's past love lives that could be disturbing to sensitive or easily offended readers, so be warned. This story is intended for mature readers at least 16 and up.

‘Twas The Night Before Zombies….

Nick held open the passenger door of his Land Cruiser while Juliette slipped inside, his expression a kaleidoscope of emotions – relief, gratitude, regret, love, worry.

After all they’d been through, put each other through, much of it thanks to Adalind’s cruel machinations, they were fully themselves again, reconnected, Juliette’s memories of him restored. Her love and determination had even broken through his psychotoxic obsession induced by the Musai Khloe’s deadly kiss and stopped him from shooting his perceived rival for Khloe in a holding cell in front of multiple witnesses, including Captain Renard.

Standing together at the curb outside the police precinct in the cool darkness, their devoted friends watched them drive away together, Nick taking his lady home to the house they’d shared in happier times. Each of his friends couldn’t help imagining the difficult conversation that would take place in the departing car between the Grimm and his all-too-human girlfriend.

Monroe and Rosalee stood close together not quite touching while Hank leaned on his crutches nearby.

“Damn, that was close,” Nick’s detective partner swore softly. “I thought we’d lost him for sure. There’d be no coming back from shooting a prisoner in his cell like that.”

“But Juliette got through,” Rosalee said. Her voice was hushed with awe. “Real love broke the overwhelming obsessive desire.”

“Nick needs to write that one into his Grimm books,” Monroe said. “At least that’s one alternative to the usual ‘off with their heads’. Before, that was the only way they knew to deal with a Musai.”

“We need to write it into _our_ books, too. My Wesen medical texts had nothing to offer for treatment, either.” Rosalee looked thoughtful. “It has to be something in the psychopharmacology generated by feelings of deep, devoted love when the victim reconnects with the true beloved.”

“Aren’t you the romantic?” Monroe teased her gently, nudging her with an elbow, and Hank chuckled. “It couldn’t be something else, something, I don’t know, psychic? Spiritual? Something you can’t scientifically quantify?”

“So it was a duel between chemically induced obsession and the real thing,” Hank mused. “I mean the _real_ real thing.”

“Looks that way. Obsession sure can feel like the real thing; but it’s not, when it drives you to destruction.” Monroe spoke from devastating personal experience. “Too easy to ignore the warning signs when you’re in the grip of it, though.”

“And in this case, it didn’t start with an emotional connection but a deliberate infection,” Rosalee said, infuriated. “What a tragic mess, and what’s to keep her from doing this over and over again?”

“She already has,” Hank said, shaking his head. “In this case, I think the Grimms got it right. To stop the disease, eliminate the vector. But as a police matter our hands are tied. How do you prove a thing like that in the…what do you call it again?”

“ _Kehrseite_ world,” Monroe supplied.

“I don’t think I’ll ever be able to remember or pronounce that.” Hank sighed with frustration over Khloe’s likely release. “So, she’ll be in the wind again, seeking her next victim. Or…maybe the Captain will come up with something.”

“If anyone can, it’d be Renard. And if he does, chances are we’ll never know about it.” Monroe shook his head.

“A personal solution by a half-Royal, half-Zauberbiest.” Rosalee shuddered. “Not sure I’d _want_ to know about it. Not that I’d shed any tears for Khloe.”

“Yeah, seriously. Not buying the ‘I can’t help it’ crap,” Monroe snarled. “For god’s sake go live your own life and don’t kiss anybody! Sounds kinda mean, yeah, but really? At what cost to other people’s lives, literally? Or…I don’t know, be responsible; wear a lip condom!”

Rosalee spluttered with laughter at that, the tension broken, and Hank turned to raise both eyebrows at his Wesen friend.

Monroe shrugged. “Just sayin’….”

“Well – they’re gone. Nothing more for us to do tonight. Guess I’d better get on home.” Hank flexed his hands on the crutches. “A fine selection of frozen dinners awaits.”

“I can’t just go home now and not know what happens with Nick and Juliette,” Rosalee said. “Things are too confused and fragile for him to stay the night, don’t you think?”

“Hell if I know. What little I ever thought I knew about relationships keeps getting blown out the window the more I hang around with this Grimm,” Monroe admitted.

“They’ve been through a helluva lot, especially tonight,” Hank said. “I’d bet he’ll just take her home safely and maybe they’ll set up a time to talk all this through. But I don’t win any prizes with my relationship track record, either.”

With a quick, regretful glance at Rosalee, Monroe gave in to the inevitable. Their private dinner together, repeatedly postponed since the night Nick had blundered in on their first passionate embrace in Monroe’s kitchen, would have to wait again. “Well…we could all go back to my place, maybe pick up some dinner on the way, have a beer and wait for Nick to get home. He’ll need to eat, too, and it’s getting kind of late to cook.”

Rosalee’s eyes mirrored his disappointment. She bit her lip but nodded; this was not their night. Again. Too much drama, trauma and distraction.

 

Not long after, the artisanal wood-fired pizzas were keeping warm in the oven, one with “the works” including sausage, pepperoni and anchovies, the other vegetarian, a Mediterranean combination of tomatoes, onions, peppers, feta, olives and lots of garlic. Their mouth-watering aromas wafted through the house.

They had all just settled in the living room, Hank stretching out his long legs in the orange armchair, crutches on the floor and Rosalee curled up on the end of the couch closest to him with her glass of wine while Monroe brought very welcome cold beers from the kitchen for himself and Hank.

They looked up as keys rattled in the front door and Nick came in, looking a little dazed – then surprised, to find everyone there and looking at him expectantly.

Holding the two beers, Monroe looked across the room at his erstwhile housemate standing in the entry. “Well?”

“So?” prompted Hank.

“What happened with Juliette?” Rosalee asked.

Nick managed a smile. “We’re going to try that dinner again tomorrow night.”

“All right!” Hank said, beaming and accepting his beer from Monroe.

“That’s so great to hear!” Rosalee enthused as Nick came in and settled on the opposite end of the couch with a smile.

Unfortunately, then, Monroe stood in front of the fireplace with his beer and launched into one of his excited rambling rants. “Well, it is, it is. But that’s a kind of make-or-break dinner, right? I mean, there’s a lot riding on it!”

Nick’s smile began to fade as Rosalee tried gently to derail their host. “Monroe, they have a lot to work out, but she’s more ready now than she’s ever been.”

Hank intervened on behalf of his beleaguered partner. “Yeah, let’s not put any more pressure on him than there already is.”

“Or her.” Rosalee was Juliette’s champion.

“Right. You’re right, I know,” Monroe agreed. “I’m sure they’re both under enough…” Still standing, beer in one hand, gesturing with the other, he shook his head in amazement at it all. “I mean, _phew,_ I can’t even imagine!” Looking up at the ceiling, then at Nick, he was off and running again. “With the _memory loss_ and then the _purification spell_ ….”

From her corner of the couch by Hank, Rosalee tried to get Monroe’s attention with a wide-eyed warning while Hank looked toward Nick with concern. Nick’s smile grew more and more strained and he looked at the floor as Monroe detailed their traumas.

“And then, _oh my god_ , what happened with the Captain!”

“Okay, I know. We’re good!” Rosalee interjected, but by now Nick looked distressed, his fingertips to his forehead.

“Right – sorry! Right.” Monroe nodded and looked down, but took another deep breath and started again, “But I just want to say….”

In a low warning voice, Hank said, _“Monroe_ …”

“No, no, this is positive!” Looking back at Nick, Monroe went on, nodding and waving his beer. “I just want to say, that despite _all_ that’s gone on, you know, _all_ we’ve been through, I think we need to appreciate the fact that…”

Rosalee sternly shook her head, staring at him and mouthing silently, “Stop talking!”

Hank gave him a withering look and Rosalee shifted worried eyes toward Nick. Nick’s smile became tighter, more forced and then faded entirely while his well-meaning but oblivious friend rattled on.

“…at last, things are starting to go _pretty well_.”

When Monroe finally finished, the room was tense and silent except for the loud ticking of clocks, everyone staring at him.

“What?” It finally dawned on him and he protested, “I _did not_ just curse it!” and took a swig of his beer.

After a long moment Hank shook his head and looked over at his distressed partner. “Can’t speak for the rest of you, but I’m starved, and that pizza doesn’t seem to be flying out of the oven by itself.”

“Right!” Grateful for the reprieve, Monroe headed for the kitchen.

Rosalee uncurled from the couch to reach Hank’s crutches and hand them to him. “Let’s go to the dining room, it’ll be easier than balancing plates,” she directed. “Sit wherever’s most comfortable, Hank.”

“I’ll take the end.” He made his way carefully through the rooms full of eclectic breakables, still mastering the skill of getting around on crutches in tight places. “C’mon, Nick. I can vouch that you haven’t had a decent meal in days.”

“Is that why I’m so hungry?” The stress somewhat reduced, his friends’ attention directed elsewhere, Nick felt his stomach rumble at the smell of food.

Settled at the table, Hank at one end, Nick at the other, Monroe sat across from Rosalee. They looked wistfully at each other – plans foiled again.

 

The shared meal didn’t last long. Everyone was drained from the events of the day, so after the pizzas and salads were gone and drinks were finished, Nick stifled a yawn and announced he was heading up to bed and Hank said he needed to get home.

“Crime never sleeps,” he said, limping toward the door. “So we don’t get much, either. Thanks for dinner. Nice to get away from the microwave and flat screen, especially after today.”

“I’ll drive Rosalee home, back in a bit.” Monroe looked over at his housemate and said, a bit sardonically, “Don’t wait up.”

Nick closed his eyes and shook his head in apology, understanding that he’d interfered in Monroe’s oft-thwarted love life again.

 

Traffic being light in the late evening, the drive back to the Spice Shop only took about fifteen minutes. They talked some more about the Musai and the mystery of how Juliette’s love had defeated Khloe’s obsession-inducing toxin, and about their hopes for their friends’ reconciliation dinner the next night.

Monroe apologized for his rant about all the pressure on Nick to make that crucial dinner work. “I felt so bad when I finally realized. It just got away from me, you know? How sometimes whatever’s running through my head just spills out my mouth? Sometimes it’s stress, sometimes it’s relief or, I don’t know, it just happens. I should have listened to you.”

“I know. On both counts.” Rosalee smiled and patted his thigh as he drove. “It’ll be okay. What you said won’t turn the tide one way or the other. Nick… _they_ have to be thinking all those same things, or trying not to.”

“I was no help,” he said, chagrined.

“You were a lot of help, especially with Juliette,” she assured him. “I nearly swallowed my tongue when Juliette asked us if Nick’s ‘other woman’ was Wesen!”

“I thought my eyes were going to pop out! Especially when she asked if…well, just straight out _said_ , we believed him. And you said we do. Boy, if she only realized why!”

“I’m not sure she’s ready for that. But if she’s going to stay with Nick, someday…someday, she’ll have to see the reality, not just the books.”

“Just hope it’s not something too awful, like a Lebensauger or, god forbid, a Hexenbiest!”

“One in particular,” Rosalee said darkly.

He pulled the yellow Beetle into an empty space behind Rosalee’s little brown Fiat parked in front of the shop, its windows all but obscured by raindrops. They got out and he gallantly took the squeegee from his car to clear her windows so she could see to drive.

Rosalee stood by watching, knowing it was no use to offer to do that herself. “We _are_ going to have that dinner I asked you to,” she said firmly, “even if I have to bring it over to your house.”

“Kinda defeats the purpose with Nick there, if we want guaranteed alone time.” Monroe cleared the last droplets off the rear window and wiped the squeegee with a cotton towel he kept with it in his car.

Rosalee pressed her lips together, closed her eyes, then ventured, “About that….”

Monroe straightened from putting the squeegee away and looked down at her, quietly serious. “Yeah. I know.”

“We need to talk, before we…find ourselves….”

He nodded reluctantly. “We do.”

“But not out here in the street. Follow me home?”

“I will; let’s hope I can find parking.” He managed a quick smile and climbed back into his car, following her back to Freddy’s neighborhood.

He still thought of it as Freddy Calvert’s place, even though he’d never been there until after Rosalee’s brother was murdered. It was a fairly dense neighborhood of single and duplex Craftsman-era houses not far from Exotic Spice and Tea, most of them restored and nicely kept. Rosalee pulled into the driveway and Monroe was lucky to find a small spot at the curb near the corner. He met her at the porch steps and they walked up together quietly as the upstairs neighbor, the landlord, was no doubt asleep.

She pulled keys from her purse and unlocked the door. Turning to Monroe, she stroked his beard and touched soft fingertips to his lips. “I’ll make us some tea, and we can talk. Just talk, I promise.”

Wincing at the necessity of that, he sighed and nodded agreement, following her through the door as she went in and flicked on some lights.

She dropped her purse and jacket on the end of the soft leather couch, the couch where Monroe had spent an uncomfortable night soon after he’d met her when she’d asked Nick if his “other partner” could come over to guard her from the Jay-addict Skalengecks who’d attacked her at the Spice Shop.

He lingered in the living room, looking around while Rosalee went through to the compact kitchen to put a kettle on. It looked very much the same as the first time he’d seen it, a comfortable eclectic blend of vintage and contemporary furniture, everything in soothing earth tones. The walls were lined with shelves of books, curios and family photos; exotic dried plants were draped and hung everywhere, some decorative, some practical. Like Monroe’s own home, Freddy had furnished and decorated in ways that reflected his interests and his work, creating a personal retreat of soothing colors, textures, light and shadow, and highlighted with eccentric items unique and cherished by their owner.

Moving around the room, looking at the now-familiar photos of her family members he’d never or barely met, he couldn’t help thinking about the hours he’d spent here with Rosalee as their friendship had grown and deepened, sharing meals in the cozy dining room, watching movies on that old brown couch, talking about everything except the big question now looming between them since their deep and cherished friendship had warmed into something more. But they dared not avoid it any longer.

“You sure haven’t changed much since taking over Freddy’s place,” he said loudly enough for her to hear in the kitchen, and immediately regretted reminding her of the traumatic loss of her brother.

But Rosalee seemed unbothered as she came out with a basket of assorted teas. “A few things here and there. I took over the master bedroom, of course, the guest room’s pretty small. I always liked the way he arranged things; you can see how much the shop reflects his touch…and for that matter, how much the shop influenced his home. I’ve always felt comfortable here.”

“He lived here a long time,” Monroe guessed, by the feel of the place.

“Yeah, since way before my folks retired and left him the shop. The landlord’s been a close friend of his ever since they went to school together. Lionel was devastated when Freddy was killed. He was more than willing to have me take over the lease; he still likes to come and visit, reminisce over coffee or something stronger.” She was sorting through the wide variety of tea bags as she talked. “He says he can feel Freddy’s presence when he’s here, since I haven’t really changed things.”

“Hmm. Like, a spirit presence?”

“Not specifically; maybe it feels that way to him. I kind of wondered, both of them single, never seeming to date anyone, if they were more than friends or if they were just two confirmed bachelors comfortable in their companionship.”

“Huh. Never thought about that. I only knew Freddy from the shop, nothing about his personal life except that he was really dedicated to our community.”

“Yeah, to the point of covertly helping the Resistance, arranging for fake identities and passports – even for himself, I still haven’t figured that out. Not to mention being the Portland region’s Wesen Council contact. I sincerely doubt Lionel knows any of that.” She pulled out a handful of teabags and considered them.

“What kind of Wesen is Lionel?”

“That’s the thing; he’s not. He’s kehrseite, and not schlich-kennen.”

“Seriously? Wow. Goes to show you can be close to someone a long time without ever really knowing them.” Monroe shook his head, thinking about some neighbors, business acquaintances and clients he was friendly with who probably thought they knew him.

“Probably not the time for much caffeine.” She held out a selection of herbal teas, some exotic, some familiar.

“Definitely not the sleepy-time blend. I don’t want to be woozy on my way home this late.”

“How about the stress relief blend? Kava, cinnamon oil, pomegranate and carob pod. It tastes better than it sounds, and it’s not soporific.”

“Stress relief is good.” _And we’re going to need it_ , he thought privately.

She turned back toward the kitchen, talking about Freddy again, both of them consciously avoiding the reason Monroe was there. “I don’t mean this in a paranormal way, maybe more like what Lionel’s sensing, but…surrounded by his things, living in his home, helps me still feel connected to Freddy in some way. Like he’s still here with me, watching over me but not communicating in any way.”

Monroe silently agreed, recognizing the same sense that made him not entirely comfortable there, as though somehow Freddy knew his unspoken feelings and intentions toward Rosalee and likely would not approve.

“I’ll bring the cups and teapot out; the kitchen table’s not that comfortable.” She paused at the doorway and looked back at him reluctantly. “And this is already uncomfortable enough.”

There it was. Their eyes met and Monroe sighed, nodded once. “You could say that.”

He settled on the couch near the fireplace, opposite Rosalee’s jacket and purse. A recent photo of Freddy and Rosalee in front of the shop, hugging and smiling, stared back at him from a bookshelf across the room. He suspected it was from her last visit before Freddy was killed.

Soon he heard the kettle’s shrill whistle start in the kitchen and Rosalee quickly took it off the heat, filling a teapot as the kettle whined while she poured. A few moments later she emerged with a tray, the well-loved rose porcelain teapot, two mugs, honey and a spoon. He rose to help her settle it on the coffee table, their hands brushing as he took the tray, the touch unusually charged by their discomfort.

“It needs some time to brew,” she murmured unnecessarily before moving around the table, shoving her purse and jacket against the arm of the couch to make more room. She tucked one leg under her as she sank onto the brown leather, turning to face Monroe as he resumed his seat. They looked at each other for a long moment, complex emotions playing behind their eyes.

Finally with a wan smile Rosalee said, “So….”

Monroe took a long breath. “So….” He leaned forward, hands clasped, arms resting on his lap. “About the other night. I’ve been thinking about it. A lot.”

“Me, too. If Nick hadn’t barged in…and I admit, I was royally pissed when he did….”

He nodded rapidly. “You and me both. We backed off into our opposite corners like guilty teenagers when the parents come home early.”

She couldn’t help a quick smile at that, flashing white teeth. “We did, and that’s exactly how it felt. First that sudden moment when we looked at each other and just…it was all right there. I’m not sure who moved first, but we were finally holding each other and it felt so good to kiss you, and keep kissing you….” Once started, her words came pouring out as Monroe nodded, reflecting those feelings. “And then the burning resentment when he came in and ruined it. I mean, we’re mature adults, we were in private, in your house, we weren’t doing anything wrong….”

“Not yet,” Monroe said softly.

Her shoulders slumped a little. “I know. I felt so…I wanted…I didn’t want to stop.” There was longing, and a glimmer of fear, in her lovely brown eyes.

“I know. Me, too. We could’ve, kind of, been ‘swept away’….”

Her eyes widened. “Yeah. Could’ve happened.”

“And we weren’t ready. We haven’t…really…” he struggled for the words, “had an adult conversation about….”

Rosalee waved a hand back and forth between them. “Where we’re going with…this.”

He nodded and then shook his head, closing his eyes briefly, neither of them wanting to have this talk but knowing that they must.

“I know it’s not romantic.” Rosalee smiled with sympathy and closed one hand over his. “And _you_ are a _certifiable_ romantic, that I know for sure.”

He chuckled softly, admitting it. “I am. Not the way I used to be.... Well, I _am_ the way I used to be, before I flew off the rails and lost myself.” He looked at her sadly. “But I can’t pretend that never happened. I wish I could.”

Rosalee nodded, squeezing his hand. “Exactly. We’re not a couple of naïve kids; we don’t have that excuse. We both have a lot of…history.” She sighed deeply and lowered her eyes. “And some of mine’s pretty sordid. I don’t mean Ian; that was young love, first heartbreak. And it was a doozy. But after he left me, I was so devastated, I made a lot of bad choices. Before and after the Jay.” She glanced up. “It’s like, don’t love deeply so you don’t get hurt deeply either.”

He nodded, understanding all too well.

She took a long breath and came out with it. “There’ve been other…not all of them Fuchsbau. But I’ve never been with anyone...” She looked into his eyes, lost.

Monroe said gently, “As dangerous as me.”

She nodded painfully, eyes bright with sudden tears. “I didn’t care about the others, not really. I thought I did at the time, but we were all so messed up, so strung out…and when it came down to it, that’s what mattered to us, way more than each other. The next party, the next trauminsel, the next high. I just made sure I wasn’t with anyone I couldn’t _fight off_ if I had to.” She shook her head fiercely as if to banish that lost part of her life. “That was a long time ago. I haven’t been with anyone since I stayed sober.”

“Yeah, I can believe it. When you first came back here from Seattle, you were like, shields up, repel all boarders, _no pasarán_.”

She smiled tightly, nodding. “I was so brittle. It was all I could do not to shatter into a million pieces. I only held it together for Freddy.” She glanced at the framed photo across the room. “I had to do right by him, the way he did for me. He’s the only one who didn’t give up and abandon me. All I could do was bury him properly and push for whatever justice there could be. And all the justice in the world couldn’t bring him back to me.” The tears brimmed in her lashes without yet falling.

“I kind of got that feeling when you were handling all his affairs alone, and your mom and sister were so…aloof at the funeral and the trials.” Monroe had stood beside her, quietly supportive, at the well-attended funeral. It seemed that most of the Portland area Wesen community had turned out to mourn Freddy Calvert, at least the law-abiding, mainstreaming ones. Nick had wisely stayed away.

“We’ve been estranged a long time, since before my father died. I doubt they’ll ever willingly speak to me again.” She took a long, cleansing breath and let it out slowly through barely parted lips. “But they’re not the issue here. I need to tell you….” She stopped, then pushed through the shame. “In recovery, we all got tested…for a lot of things addicts are vulnerable to, given that life. I was lucky.” Her tone was bitter. “They were able to cure everything they found. By the time I graduated from the program, sober for a year, I was clean, and I’ve stayed that way.”

“I know that one,” Monroe said ruefully. “My _wieder_ program’s the same. When you’re as out of control as most of us were, there’s no telling what people might’ve picked up. I didn’t really sleep around much…more like serial monogamy, I guess. But when I took up with Angelina – well, you know what she was like. That thing they say about when you sleep with someone, you’re also sleeping with every partner they ever had?”

Rosalee grimaced and squeezed her shoulders tight. “Eww. Yeah, I hated that but it sure got the message through.”

“She was sheer impulse and libido, live for the moment, take your pleasures where you find them. So _into_ her wild side, completely different from my own background or anyone I’d ever known. She just bowled me over. I was so crazy about her – and then just crazy; it didn’t matter. When I finally crawled away from that disaster and found the _wieder_ program, routine testing was mandatory. I was lucky, too.”

He sighed heavily. “When she came back to Portland after her brother Rolf was killed, Hap was staying with me ‘cause someone had just blown up _his_ house, too. I hadn’t seen her in years; god knows what all she’d been doing. But she was like a force of nature, and I lapsed. When that tragic mess was over I had myself tested again. I’m clean, too.” His eyes widened as they looked at each other. “Damn, that was awkward!”

“I know, right?” Hers widened back at him and they stared at each other a moment before both burst into embarrassed laughter.

“That was almost as bad as I was afraid it would be,” Rosalee said, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. “Except you didn’t judge or reject me. Not yet, anyway….”

“Are you kidding? You only hurt yourself…and yeah, your family. I’ve hurt mine, too, and a lot worse than that. I don’t think they’ll ever understand why I can’t go back to the old ways with them, but I can’t. There’s way too much blood under that bridge, and I am not ever going there again.”

He watched her reaction to that and nodded when she winced. “And there the other shoe falls.”

She closed her eyes tightly, brow furrowed.

“I’m Blutbad, albeit reformed. And you’re Fuchsbau. We are what we are. And we both know the traditions, the restrictions about that – some for good reason.”

“And some just ancient prejudice and bigotry.” Her words were biting but her eyes were still closed.

“Granted. But that part aside….” This time he closed his hands gently over her anxiously clenched fists. “We have to think about what that means for you and me. The risks, the dangers. I haven’t been with anyone but my own kind; we don’t know how different we are when it comes to that kind of…intimacy. Even if we never _woge_ , stay as human as we can, what we were feeling and wanting the other night – we can’t be sure it won’t…get away from us.”

“You would never hurt me,” she whispered.

“I’d never _mean_ to hurt or scare you; it would kill me if I did. But I’m not sure how to be with a woman who’s not Blutbad, how…fragile you might be.”

“Believe me, I have thought about it. Risking any new relationship was scary enough with my past. I think that’s why this snuck up on me. You were my only friend when I desperately needed one; before long you were the best friend I’ve ever had. And you never pushed. You’re so protective, kind, funny, attentive, not to mention all the bizarre adventures we’ve been through. Then you really caught me off guard when you showed up with that picnic basket!”

“That was…I couldn’t think of another way to kind of, you know, test the waters without risking your trust in our friendship. I mean, friends go to lunch all the time, we did, so why not a picnic? Except….”

“Except I felt it was…almost like a date.”

“But not quite, and I desperately didn’t want to ruin things between us by trying to, you know, move it to another level if that was somewhere you would never want to go.”

“But it _was_ a date, the way it turned out.” She smiled fondly at the memory. “I hadn’t let myself admit that I was having glimmers of those feelings for you, too. That time away from everyone and our familiar places, just the two of us lounging on the blanket, eating and talking, it was intimate in a way that sitting at a table could never be. Looking at you lying there, being so vulnerable, I just kind of…softened inside. It let me feel a kind of hope I never thought I’d feel again, and then I could admit to myself I was attracted to you as a man as well as my friend. A man who also happened to be Blutbad.”

“Hence the ‘not rushing into things’…thing.”

“At that point I was so afraid of having those kinds of feelings again, even though my life felt empty without them. But if I could feel them with you, my best friend, my safe space…maybe, just maybe we could find our way there. I was only thinking about the emotional side then, not physical side. Not beyond a kiss.”

“And then, _fluvus_.” He shook his head. “It’s always been so hard for us to catch a break, you know? It’s always something at just the wrong time, or we get a nice interlude and then BAM, something else gets in our way. _Fluvus_ , Angelina, your sick aunt….”

She shook her head. “How long have you felt…when did you know you wanted to be more than friends?”

“Oh, man, way back. But I had zero hope it’d be anything but unrequited. Just platonic, you know? I think it really hit me when Ian showed up and I watched you taking care of him, saw you _woge_ together. Damn, that woke the Big Green Monster more than I’d ever felt before. And then when Waltz threatened your life, nothing mattered but keeping you safe, not even my own life. I didn’t want a life without you in it.” His eyes crinkled in dark amusement. “It was the first time we got rid of a body together.”

She looked up at the memory of that crisis, flashing a quick smile. “We made a pretty good team already back then.”

“We did.” He regarded her solemnly. “But after that I couldn’t delude myself any more. What I felt went way beyond friendship. But I was resigned to settle for that to have you in my life.”

Tears welled again and trickled down through her lashes. “But we’re beyond that now.”

“Are we? I don’t mean the feelings. I mean the, ah, actions that follow…could follow. Almost did, if not for Nick.”

“If not for Nick,” she agreed, voice strained. She relaxed her fists, opening her hands in his and letting their fingers entwine. “I have thought about it, for quite awhile now…and I’ll admit, fantasized about it. And I’ve even…” She took a deep breath and forged ahead before she lost her nerve. “Okay, just so you know. I lived in a really sketchy neighborhood in Seattle. That crappy studio apartment was all I could afford working as a pharmacy tech and the streets weren’t safe, especially at night. I wasn’t sleeping with anyone, completely celibate, but I was taking no chances; I got an IUD just in case I was ever…attacked. So if we had been ‘swept away’ the other night, we’d have been safe from _that_ risk, anyway.” She gave him a tremulous smile. “How’s that for awkward?”

Monroe almost choked on his nervous laugh. “Pretty awkward. But I never would’ve let you risk…that.”

She laughed with him. “I’m sure, but I hate using condoms and don’t really trust them.” Putting on her professional apothecary voice she said, “But then of course, you have to make sure that your partner is….”

“Clean,” they said in unison, laughing anxiously some more.

“But that doesn’t mean we’re ready, or that we ever could be,” he said gently. “We’re still very, very different creatures. I know what I felt when we kissed, and how much I wanted….”

“What I wanted, and what we almost did. But now, there’s just that one question between us, and I think…we need to just trust that, if and when, we’ll know?”

He nodded with resignation. “I guess...that’s all we can do.”

Nodding with him, she squeezed his hands. “And that said, how about if I bring our much-delayed dinner to your house tomorrow night so we can wait together to find out what happens with Juliette and Nick? We both still have to eat, and I don’t want to wait alone. I already bought the food for the menu I’d planned.”

He gazed at her a long moment, searching her eyes. “Bring dinner into the wolf’s den, are you sure?”

“I was thinking more the dinette, actually.” She smiled. “I feel safer and almost as comfortable at your home as I do here.”

“Then by all means. Let’s have that dinner and we can nervously watch all the clocks like reverse chaperones to see if Nick comes back – and what condition he’s in when he does.” His smile faded a bit. “We’d better have enough for three in case things don’t go so well and he bounces back needing our help and support, sympathy, whatever we can do for him.”

“No worries, the recipe makes plenty for three, with leftovers.”

“Then we’re good.”

She leaned in close to him. “I think we are.”

Their hands still clasped, they kissed, a tender, healing kiss.

When they drew back, Monroe said reluctantly, “We better get some sleep. I’ve got a lot of work to catch up on tomorrow.”

“Me, too. All this ‘drop everything right now!’ Grimm business is cutting into my own.”

“No kidding.” He glanced at the coffee table. “We never did pour that tea.”

“Ohhh, I forgot all about it! I’m sorry. It’ll be strong enough to strip the paint off the Fremont Bridge by now!”

He held out his palms toward the pot as if to fend off the evil brew. “Thanks, I’ll pass. See you tomorrow night then, if not before. Bud’s coming by around noon to see what’s up with my balky fridge.”

“Go, then.” She stood with him and then impulsively threw her arms around him in a fierce hug. Surprised and pleased, he hugged her back, both of them swaying together.

“I’m so glad this…this _talk_ is over!” she sighed with relief, resting her head against his shoulder. “However things play out, at least we know.”

“We know all that we can know, for now,” he said gently.

“For now.” She lifted her face and he bent to kiss her goodnight, a warm but not lingering kiss. They both knew they had to part.

This was not the night.

 

The next day was, to say the least, _momentous_. The wild events of their day began with Juliette’s unannounced appearance at Monroe’s house in the early afternoon, insisting that he show her what Nick wanted him to show her the night she fell into the coma; the thing that was supposed to convince her all the crazy things Nick was telling her were true.

“So I want you to show me _now_ ,” she insisted. “And, I’m _not_ going to leave until you do.”

Which led to Monroe dragging Bud along with them, his fridge repair on hold, to the Spice Shop where without warning Rosalee found herself going first to show Juliette, up close and personal, what a _woge_ is…followed by the panicked Bud, and then, most disturbing of all, Monroe.

Mind-bending as it was for Juliette, it was also life altering for the three of them – none of them had ever _woged_ for a kehrseite before, or even knew another Wesen who had. And this was _Nick’s_ Juliette whose sanity was at risk, leaving them to somehow deal with whatever the fallout was from their revelation.

Small wonder that when Juliette, her world just shattered and reformed into a radically different reality, asked, “Anybody got a drink?” they had fallen all over each other agreeing that was an excellent idea, Rosalee and Monroe reaching for a bottle and glasses.

As they each took a good stiff shot, soon followed by another, it seemed a very civilized and therapeutic way to deal with their collective shock over what had just happened between them. Juliette had dozens of questions, though she tried to couch them as politely as possible, uncertain of the etiquette in this bizarre situation. “What does it feel like? Does it happen when you’re children? Are there a lot of you…all kinds of you, around Portland?” And to Bud’s dismay, “So is Phoebe a…what was it?”

“Eisbiber,” he managed, wide-eyed.

“Is she an Eisbiber, too? Then your kids…”

“Yeah, yeah,” he admitted. “We all are. That’s how it works. Runs in the family, you might say. Doesn’t skip a generation or anything like that.”

At that remark, Rosalee had to stifle a giggle. She gave poor Bud a calming pat on his shoulder and the high-strung man relaxed a little.

“It’s okay, really, Nick knows all about it,” he assured Juliette. “He’s even an honorary member of our Lodge.”

Juliette’s luminous eyes widened at that and the corners of her mouth quirked in a smile, but to her credit she managed to keep her composure.

After Juliette left for home, it fell to Monroe to call Nick and ask him to come to the shop as soon as he could. “We have something sort of important to go over with you,” one of the understatements of their lives.

Bud lingered with them until Nick and Hank arrived, helping to explain to Portland’s Grimm what had just happened. It was up to Juliette whether she could make the transition to kehrseite-schlich-kennen, but at least now, as Hank assured them, having himself been through this revelation not so long ago, she knew the truth.

The already high stakes for Nick’s reconciliation dinner with Juliette had now shot into the stratosphere.

After the stunned Grimm detective left with Hank, Bud said, “Hoo, boy, what a day. I’ve never _had_ a day like this…I don’t ever _want_ to have another day like this! I…I gotta stop by my shop to get that fan for your fridge, Monroe, or you’re gonna be living out of ice chests by tomorrow. I’ll meet you back there.”

As the distraught Eisbiber collected his jacket and his wits, he headed out the door still babbling. “Oh my god, I’ve got to tell my wife what happened. How am I gonna tell Phoebe I full- _woged_ in front of _Nick’s Juliette?_ It’ll have to be after the kids are in bed. Maybe I’ll tell her in the basement, or outside, somewhere they can’t hear. Or…or maybe I’ll call her from the shop and tell her to make sure the kids are in another room before I tell her on the phone. And even then maybe _she_ should be in the basement, with the door closed! Ohhh, I can’t believe this really happened!”

They watched him go and when the shop was empty and quiet again, Monroe said, “For once, what’s going on in _my_ head sounds an awful lot like Bud on a rant. I can’t believe what just happened, either.”

“I’m…I’m…kind of speechless. I never in this world imagined I’d ever _woge_ in front of a kehrseite under any circumstances, let alone like this!” She turned to Monroe and frowned. “By the way, thanks for the ambush.”

“Sorry about that. She did the same thing to me and with all that going on, it didn’t occur to me to call ahead and warn you, not that it would have done any good…would it?”

She sighed, her shoulders drooping. “No…I guess not. It just would have given me a few more minutes to stress out before you got here. But it’s over…our part anyway, for now. I just hope she…and Nick, are going to be okay.”

“Well, Hank made the transition, and he was able to accept it under much more stressful conditions than Juliette’s today,” Monroe said, a note of hope in his voice. “He just keeps saying at least he finally knew he wasn’t crazy.”

“Let’s hope so,” she said fervently, “for everyone’s sake.”

“Kinda raised the stakes on their dinner tonight, as if they weren’t high enough already.” Monroe glanced at his watch and said apologetically, “I better get back to let Bud in, and see if there’s anything I can do to help Nick get ready and out the door in a decent state of mind.”

“Yes, good, please do that.” As he turned to leave, she said, “Oh…what about us?”

“Us?”

“Yeah, dinner. Are we still on tonight, at your place?”

“Oh – _hell_ , yes, please! I sure don’t want to wait this one out alone, no clue what kind of shape he’ll be in when he comes back.” He looked back at her, adding with a wistful note, “If he comes back tonight.”

“Yeah,” she said softly. “I guess…we’ll see.”

 

Bud was as good as his word, though the whole time he was replacing the refrigerator’s fan he was still dithering about how to tell his wife that he’d helped introduce the Grimm’s lady love to the Wesen world by full- _woging_ in front of her.

“I mean, I just don’t _do_ that kind of thing! _Who does_ that kind of thing? It’s not against the Ehrenkodex, is it? I can’t remember. Oh my god, I didn’t think about that! What if the Council finds out? I’ve got a wife and three kids!”

“Bud! Bud, take it easy, man,” Monroe assured him. “It’s not against the Ehrenkodex when it’s bringing someone we care for into the fold, so to speak, so they maybe don’t go crazy from the things they’ve seen and can’t understand.”

“But now _I’m_ one of the crazy things she’s seen! You, she, everybody really put me on the spot – I never meant to do that! It just…just _came over_ me.”

It surprised Monroe that the highly agitated Eisbiber was still deftly removing the worn out fan and installing the new one the whole time he carried on with his distraught babble. But then, given how often Bud was in that state, Monroe decided that Bud must have adapted to doing meticulous work while freaking out a long time ago or Wurstner’s Appliance Repair wouldn’t still be in business.

By the time Bud had packed up his tools and was out the kitchen door, heading down the stairs to Monroe’s driveway, he was still stewing over whether to tell Phoebe before or after dinner, or after they were sure the kids were asleep but before the two of them went to bed, or…. “She usually makes pot roast on Tuesday nights. I love her pot roast, so if I’m too upset to eat it she’ll know something’s going on…”

“Good night, Bud,” Monroe called after him, fondly amused. “Don’t forget to give Phoebe my check, okay?” Phoebe ran the financial side of their family business.

“Right, right, okay. Good night! Oh, _man_ …what’s she going to say when I tell her?” And Bud was off again, babbling all the way out to his big old orange pickup.

Fortunately for the Eisbiber’s blood pressure, Nick got home just after Bud drove away. Nodding to Monroe in his workroom as he came through the front door, he hung up his jacket and jogged straight upstairs, returning a few minutes later with a towel and a change of clothes and disappearing into the downstairs bathroom.

Monroe concentrated on the grandmother clock he was fixing, trying to hurry because his work had been interrupted so egregiously lately and he was running behind on his “promised by” dates. He heard the shower run, rather briefly, and soon Nick emerged in fresh clothes, his hair damp and blue eyes rather wide.

“Do I look okay?”

“You’re asking me?” More than once Nick had teased Monroe about his vaguely hipsterish clothes and grooming. But he took mercy on his understandably anxious friend. “You look fine, once you’ve dried out around the edges.”

“Okay, then. I guess it’s time to do this.” Nick looked at the closed front door as if it were the gladiators’ gate into the Roman Coliseum.

“Whoa, wait just a minute. Word of advice from a confessed hopeless romantic?”

Nick looked at him askance. _“Really?”_

“Really. Pick up some flowers along the way. I’m serious. It’ll help break that at-the-front-door-threshold ice.”

Nick took a deep breath and released it, nodding. “That _is_ a good idea. I’ll do it. Wish me luck…we’re going to need it.”

“All the luck in the world, dude, to both of you.”

And after the door closed behind Nick, Monroe added, “And to us all. We’re going to need it, too.”

He set the clock aside and went upstairs to freshen up in anticipation of his dinner with Rosalee.

 

Portland’s premier Wesen apothecary locked up her shop nearly an hour after its official closing time, also trying to catch up on her work after all the day’s emotionally charged interruptions. Rosalee drove back to her place glancing at her watch and hoping Nick would be gone by the time she arrived at Monroe’s.

She really didn’t want to run into him face to face before his evening with Juliette was over. It had been difficult enough when they told him what had happened at the shop. She breathed a fervent prayer that Juliette would be able to absorb and accept her new reality, and accept and embrace Nick for what he was.

She’d done as much meal prep as possible before dashing out the door for work that morning, so it didn’t take long to assemble the quiche and pop it in the oven. While it baked she took a refreshing shower, visualizing the warm spray washing away the extraordinary stresses of the day.

 _If Nick doesn’t come home tonight_ , the thought kept intruding, _what will happen with Monroe and me? Are we…am I ready? Could this be the night?_

Toweling off, she shivered, and not from cold. Going into her bedroom with its lovely antique brass bed, inherited from her folks and Freddy, she decided that she’d dress casually like she did for work, but be prepared underneath… just in case. Best not to look like she was expecting anything to happen, in case it didn’t.

She brushed her hair and put on minimal makeup, simple earrings and pendant, her aubergine camisole and dark jeans. Looking at herself in the tall oval full length mirror, she was startled by her rabbit-in-the-headlights expression.

“It’s _just_ dinner with Monroe while we wait for Nick,” she told herself aloud. “How many times have I had dinner with Monroe, fifty, more? I’ve cooked for him before, it’s no big deal. He’s easy to please; I know he’s going to like this.”

Her anxious reflection wasn’t buying it.

“It’s going to be _fine_. Whatever happens.” She tucked her hairbrush into her spacious leather purse and went to pack up the salad makings and dessert while the quiche finished baking.

Just after she’d pulled the main course out of the oven, her phone rang.

Monroe.

“Oh, dear, what now?” she breathed, leaning across the counter to answer it. “Hey…”

“Just thought I’d let you know, the coast is clear. He’s on his way…albeit looking like he’s driving to his execution.”

“Wow, the poor guy. But thank you, I didn’t want to run into him on my way in after everything that’s happened.”

“He’s a wreck, Bud’s a wreck…guess we’re the only grounded ones tonight and I wouldn’t be too sure about myself if you weren’t coming over. Should I open some wine, let it breathe? What are we having?”

“Don’t worry about that, I’ve got the wine, too. I should be there in about, say, half an hour. I’m waiting for the main dish to cool enough for travel.”

She felt much better hearing his voice, their conversation feeling so normal.

“Okay, good to know. I’ll be ready. See you soon.”

 

Monroe thumbed off his phone with a sigh of relief. He felt some of the tension drain away just at the sound of her voice and their mundane exchange of words. If Nick came back a basket case tonight, at least he’d have Rosalee to help him deal with it.

And if he didn’t come back…if he stayed with Juliette…

Softly cursing himself for almost certainly getting his hopes up too much, Monroe went upstairs and remade his bed, putting on the soft new robin’s egg blue sheets and pillowcases. Just on the wild chance that maybe, just maybe…he wanted everything to be perfect. For Rosalee.

He fidgeted around the room awhile longer, double-checked to make sure everything in the bathroom was in perfect order, and acknowledged that he was nervous and excited about the possibility that tonight she might first enter his inner sanctum.

Tonight, just possibly, they might at last become lovers.

Or not. Looking around the bedroom again, he thought about how lonely and empty it was going to feel again if she just went home after dinner, leaving him alone or with Nick back in the spare room down the hall.

“Just…being prepared,” he told himself. “Not that I ever leave my room messy.”

Smoothing his hair and tucking his olive, brown and honey plaid shirt neatly into his pants before he went downstairs, Monroe nodded at his appearance in the dresser mirror. “Good as it gets, I guess.”

By the time he heard her car pull up in front of the house, he had some LPs cued on the stereo and two taper candles ready to light on the cozy dinette table, crystal wine goblets and linen napkins at their places.

“Showtime,” he breathed, and went out to help her bring the dinner things in from her car.

 

The four-cheese quiche Rosalee had baked was delicious and Monroe helped himself to a second slice while they chatted over dinner, the two lit taper candles on the table and light instrumental music playing in the background making it feel like a casual yet special occasion.

“Bud called just a little before you got here,” Monroe said. “When he told Phoebe – soon as he got home, he couldn’t hold it in, her reaction was, ‘Well, it’s about time!’”

Rosalee laughed softly, relieved for their Eisbiber friends. “I shouldn’t be surprised. Phoebe’s nothing if not practical. She’s probably the only thing keeping Bud tethered to the planet.”

Monroe shook his head, grinning. “They’re such an odd pair of personalities; makes you wonder what it is that attracted them to each other?”

Rosalee’s smile widened and her eyes gleamed with mischief. “I did ask her that once when she was in the shop, out of sheer curiosity. She just looked me straight in the eyes, nodded her head and said, ‘Because he’s a _pistol.’_ ”

Monroe spluttered, nearly choking on his wine. “What? She _told_ you that?”

“I know! Well, they do have three kids.”

“But – damn!”

It felt good to laugh together like they’d always done, and helped a lot to ease their tension.

The wine she’d brought was perfectly paired with her recipe and they nearly finished the bottle between them. And later, while they sat talking over the remains of their meal with after-dinner mugs of tea, each was surreptitiously glancing at the clocks hung on nearly every wall and waiting for Nick to come through the front door…or not.

That “or not” hung in the air between them, adding an awkward note to their normally easy companionship. Rosalee was uncharacteristically anxious when Monroe complimented her on the long-postponed dinner she’d prepared for him.

“That was delicious!”

“You’re not just saying that?” “No! If I didn’t like it, I wouldn’t have had two pieces.”

“But see, that’s the problem….” And she launched into a rambling and confused rant about him taking the second piece to be polite and convince her that he liked it when in truth he didn’t…sounding very much like Monroe when he was off on one of his conversational tangents.

He turned his head to one side, looking at her askance, and shifted his eyes to one side and back at her, brow lowered in mock confusion until she stopped, recognizing by his bemused expression that he was teasing her and how silly her argument sounded.

“Did that make any sense?” she laughed nervously.

“In a circuitous and very charming way, yes.” He smiled at her fondly.

She smiled back at him and the moment hung between them. It had grown late; Nick had left for his reconciliation dinner with Juliette hours ago. The coast was clear – _finally_. As that realization hit them, their eyes met over the remains of their dinner. Their moment of truth had arrived, if they were brave enough and willing to take it.

Monroe looked down, took a deep breath and released it, then looked up at Rosalee, trying to work up to asking her to stay the night with him and worrying that she might not be ready.

Finally, he managed, “Well, Nick’s not home, so…” he knocked twice on the wooden table, “things are…we can assume…going well with Juliette.” He looked directly across the table at Rosalee, their unspoken possibility in his eyes.

Both hands around her blue tea mug, she was anxious too, looking up and aside, even out the dark window, having trouble meeting his eyes. “Yeah, it’s great. It’s going great.” Her eyes widened as she looked away and down.

Gathering his courage to ask, Monroe said, “You know, if Nick doesn’t come home tonight, uh…umm…” But he couldn’t read clearly through her squirrelly discomfort, and faltered.

The downstairs clocks ticked loudly in the charged silence between them, Rosalee watching Monroe and wanting so much for him to invite her to stay but only if he was truly ready, Monroe not wanting to press if she wasn’t ready to become lovers, and each thinking maybe it wasn’t the right time for the other, after all that had happened this momentous day.

Neither moved or said a word for a long moment. As desperately as he wanted to take Rosalee to his bed and make love to her at last, Monroe saw the complex welling of emotion in her eyes across the table and wavered. If she wasn’t ready, wasn’t sure, he was too much of a gentleman and loved her too much to push.

As the silence continued, he gave them both the space to let the moment pass without saying yes or no. “Maybe we should clean up…clean up all this. I’ll get your plate.” Rising from the table, he started taking the dishes and leftover food to the kitchen, heart sinking that tonight wasn’t their night after all.

But his Rosalee was having none of it. Decision made, she got up quickly and intercepted him as he put their dishes on the counter. Clasping his arm, she turned him to face her. She stepped closer, gliding her arm up around his neck, her eyes heavy lidded and her voice soft and seductive.

“Why don’t we do that tomorrow morning?”

 _We…tomorrow morning._ Stunned and delighted, Monroe reached for her, all thought of dishes abandoned.

They embraced and kissed, the kiss long and hungry, hands roving over each other’s bodies. When they came up for air, Rosalee looked up into Monroe’s eyes, her head tilted back, lips slightly parted. With a fluid toss of her head, she leaned back and _woged_ in his arms, gazing up with desire through her glowing amber eyes.

He smiled down at her lovely Fuchsbau face, her elegant pointed ears and adorable black nose, the soft red and white fur covering her face and neck and arms.

“Oh, you are _so hot!_ ” he told her, all hesitation gone, feeling the heat of long suppressed passion spread through him like fire.

She _unwoged_ as he spun her in his arms toward the kitchen doorway. When they reached the foot of the staircase, he swept her off her feet and carried her swiftly upstairs, his Blutbad strength bearing her as easily as if she were a child.

Rosalee laughed in delight when he lifted her. She wrapped her arms around his neck, kissing him there while he carried her to the bedroom doorway.

Just past the threshold, he set her lightly on her feet in the cozy sitting room by the upstairs hearth. His bed with its massive dark wood frame waited in the background beyond the art deco glass room dividers. They wrapped their arms around each other again in a full-body embrace, kissing hungrily, fervently, Monroe’s hand behind her head, Rosalee rising on her toes to reach him.

Breathless, they drew apart a little and looked deeply into each other’s eyes. Both eager and cautious, each felt a frisson of apprehension as they faced this crucial moment in their relationship. Monroe glanced toward the bed and Rosalee’s gaze followed his.

“Let’s see if I remember how to do this,” he joked awkwardly. “It’s been a long time.”

She laughed softly, finding his awkwardness endearing. “We’ll figure it out together. I know we’ve both been thinking about it. Imagining, hoping….”

“Worrying a little…no, a lot,” he admitted, giving voice to the concerns that had delayed this moment for so long.

One hand holding the nape of his neck, the other stroking his bearded cheek, she said, “So, let’s not rush anything. We have all night.”

“God, I hope so. Maybe we should turn off our phones.”

Rosalee gave a short, rueful laugh, squeezing her eyes shut and resting her forehead on his chest. “Soooo tempting, but he has a key and we know he’d use it.”

He stroked her back and hair, arms securely around her. She hugged his waist as they pressed together.

“But he really did feel bad about barging in on us in the kitchen the other night,” Monroe said. “I mean _really_ bad.”

“Still…does the bedroom door have a lock?”

“Nope. Never put one on, never had the need. It was just me here all these years.” He swayed gently with her in his arms. “My only overnight guests were my parents and we sure weren’t going to walk in on each other.”

“Well, we’ll just have to hope for the best. And this late, he’s got to be staying with Juliette.”

“Gotta be. Right.”

Rosalee tilted her head back to look up into his eyes. “And now, we’re here, and…” she waved a graceful hand into the room, “the bed’s right over there.” His eyes followed her hand then looked down into hers again, smoldering, and yet still he wouldn’t push.

She ran both hands through his beard, cupping his face. “This is happening, at last, tonight. “ Her eyes and voice were urgent, pleading. “I can’t stand to wait any longer. Monroe, take me to your bed and make love to me before I explode!”

He looked down at her and said in typical Monroe fashion, “Well, if memory serves, isn’t that kind of the idea? I mean, not right away but at some point in the proceedings….” and raised his eyebrows at her.

“Monroe!” She was laughing and desperate. “Believe me, I don’t think it’s going to take very long! I want you so much, and I want you right now.”

Her declaration made, they melted together, kissing passionately. Keeping her snugly in his arms, he backed into the bedroom door to close it while they kissed and fondled each other, Rosalee tugging his shirt loose at his waist. The door closed and the latch clicked. They paused at the sound and looked at each other – that “click” sealed their commitment. They were in his bedroom, door closed on the world, to _finally_ make love.

He swept her off her feet again and carried her to the bed in a few long strides. Feverishly they undressed themselves and each other, their clothes landing on the floor, including his pants with his phone still in its pocket. He drew off her sweater, then lifted her camisole over her head and she reached around him, tugging up his T-shirt while his deft clockmaker fingers unhooked her bra.

He reached back and finished the job for her, pulling his T-shirt off and dropping it on his pile of clothes left so uncharacteristically on the floor.

She ran her fingers through the dark, wiry hairs on his chest as he drew her bra straps down off her shoulders and then paused, letting the black lace cling to her breasts while he swept back the covers of the bed. Only then did they sink into those robin’s egg blue sheets, holding each other, and only then did he slide her bra the rest of the way down her arms and off over her hands and toss it across the room, revealing her lovely firm breasts with their small nipples pink and erect.

She rested her palms on his chest as he reached out and reverently cupped her breasts, stroking them gently with his thumbs and looking deeply into her eyes with gratitude and desire.

She ran her hands over his bare skin, his solid Pilates-toned body fully revealed to her at last, free of his usual layers of shirts and sweaters. He was fit without being buff and she felt his strength as she stroked over the powerful muscles of his back. They were completely bare except for their underwear now, and Monroe eased her back onto the bed, lying down to face her.

“You’re just like I’ve fantasized,” he told her. “You are lovely all over.” His fingertips trailed over her skin, touching the places always hidden before by clothes. His touch thrilled and excited her, leaving a trail of warmth she could almost see on her skin as he stroked her chest, her breasts, the curve of her side, the softness of her belly, the swell of her hip.

She pressed her hands to his chest again, covering his nipples and sinking her fingers into his chest hair, leaning into him for a kiss. They lingered over the kiss, lips pressing together lightly, kissing at the corners of each other’s mouths, upper then lower lips, then full on again, savoring the new intimacy of kissing while lying together skin to skin, hands stroking and caressing each other’s bodies.

Rosalee felt the tentative touch of his tongue on her lips and answered with the tip of her own, lightly tracing the line of his lips until he opened for her. Their tongues touched and darted into each other’s mouths, tasting and exploring, returning to touch again until she drew back just a little, breathless.

“I feel like it’s my first time all over again,” she admitted, surprised at the surge of shyness and vulnerability she was feeling. Her face felt hot and she realized she was blushing.

Monroe smiled and nodded, holding her tenderly. “I know. Me, too. And I’m going to treat you that way. There’s so much we don’t know about this…with each other.”

“We’re about to find out.”

They embraced again fully, kisses deep, tongues touching, teasing. Exploring each other’s bodies with urgent hands and mouths, they satisfied at last their long-denied desperate hunger for a lover’s touch. When their legs entwined, she felt him stiff against her belly through the thin cotton of his shorts and her lacey panties and gave a moan of need, rubbing herself against him.

Monroe stroked his hand slowly down the length of her back and sat up long enough to peel off his boxers and drop them on the floor. Then he turned back to lie beside her, eyes anxious, fully revealed to her for the first time, his erection leaving no doubt of his arousal and desire.

She let her eyes trail down his body from his face to his sex and linger there, admiring. His shaft was thick, so engorged it was almost purple, the long blue veins standing out in contrast, his glans revealed through the collar of his foreskin.

“You’re intact.”

He closed his eyes a moment, hoping she wasn’t put off. “Traditional Blutbad families don’t…unless it’s a religious thing. Hope it’s not, um, a problem….”

She reached down and grasped him with confidence, her grip firm as she gave him a stroke, gliding the sleeve of soft skin over the tip of his cock and back again.

He gasped at the shock and pleasure of her long-awaited, long-imagined intimate touch. “Okay, not a problem….”

She stroked him several times, the warm velvety skin moving under her hand up and down his shaft, eliciting his low moan of pleasure. “I’ve wanted to do that for so long….” she confessed. Then she released him and moved to slip off her panties. “My turn….”

He leaned up beside her and stayed her hands. “Allow me.” He kissed her thoroughly before trailing kisses and caresses down her body until at last he slid his fingers under the soft lace fabric and lowered the undies little by little. Rosalee lifted her hips to let him draw the panties down past her bottom, at last revealing her most secret and personal place.

He paused and gazed at her sex with reverence and desire, then up at Rosalee. She was watching him, biting her full lower lip, feeling exposed and vulnerable and aching with need.

He leaned down to kiss her there, nuzzling gratefully and hungrily into her nest of soft curls, inhaling her most intimate scents, his hands gently holding her thighs.

She reached for him, resting her hands on his bare shoulders as she felt his lips move on her delicate skin. He kissed along the furry edge of her outer labia up one side and down the other before parting her with gentle fingertips and licking his way in through the soft, swollen petals of her flesh.

She lay back on the pillows with a helpless moan and ran her fingers through his hair, stroking him as he explored her so tenderly, kissing and tasting, licking and lightly sucking until she squirmed with need and desire. “Monroe, please…!”

“Just wanted to be sure you’re ready,” he said softly, a touch of humor in his voice. “And…you’re ready.”

“I’ve been ready since I _woged_ in the kitchen,” she cried. “Please, please!”

He pulled the panties the rest of the way down over her shapely legs and feet and flung the black lacey garment off the bed. As he at last moved over her, she parted her thighs and arched her back, tilting to offer herself, her arms sliding around him and pulling him down to her.

Once in position, he cradled her in his arms and stroked her hair, gazing down into her eyes.

“We only have one first time together. I want to be what you want me to be.”

“I want you inside me – please. Please, _now_ ….”

He kissed her again and held her while he rubbed the length of his cock over her wetness, and she reached down to stroke him with a firm hand, guiding him where she wanted him. She dipped him into her juices and circled her hooded clit with the tip of his cock, then gently drew back his foreskin and slipped him between the lips of her vulva, pushing herself forward, open to him now and ready, so ready.

He gathered her in his arms and held her firmly for his first thrust, entering at long last her hot velvety wetness. She eagerly pushed up to meet him, helping to impale herself on his hardness and crying out in victory and relief as he filled her at last.

Her head tipped back on the pillows and her eyes closed, she focused on the sensation of Monroe moving in and out of her sex, unaware that she was baring her throat to him. After the first blissful thrusts, now so deeply inside her that their curly hairs mingled, he leaned down and pressed a possessive kiss on the curve of her neck with just a light brush of teeth.

She clutched him and shivered at the love bite, rising up to meet him, moving with him, both of them finding their rhythm and focused on the sensations of their merging and each response of the other.

“Ohhhhh, god, you feel good,” he breathed, filling her, drawing back and filling her again. She felt tight and hot around him.

“Mmm, beyond good,” she murmured. “I want more. I won’t break.”

“We’ll get there.” Even in the heat of their joining, his quirky humor had to come out. “Are you in a hurry?”

She laughed and her strong love muscles squeezed him involuntarily; he caught his breath in surprise.

“Sorry…I can’t help that when I laugh,” she explained helplessly.

“No apology…just surprised me.”

She smiled and relaxed into their gentle and steady rhythm, willing now to make it last; this, their first time. “What, you’ve never made a woman laugh in bed before?” He fixed her with a mock-pained expression between thrusts and she laughed again. “In _her_ , I mean?”

“Not really. Not a Blutbad thing so much.” With his next thrust he leaned down and closed his lips around her earlobe, his tongue playing with her earring.

But she’d caught the momentary look of concern cross his face as he’d lowered it to assault her ear and her smile faded.

“Am I…so different?”

“Don’t know yet. _We’re_ different…together….” He was breathing harder now, from his restrained yet energetic thrusting and…something else, something building between them.

She wrapped her legs around him, moving with him, relaxing for each penetration and now clenching him with her inner muscles each time he pulled back.

He closed his eyes and smiled. “Mmmmm.”

She smiled back, eyes glinting with pleasure and amusement. “You like that?”

“You’re…full of…surprises.” He moved inside her with each word.

“You have no idea….” Then she gasped as he pushed in harder and a little faster. “Yes, please, like that!” She shifted her hips under him so he’d stroke her inside just where she so wanted and needed it. “Oh, _there_ , yes.”

Her eyelids fluttered, eyes unfocused behind her lashes, all her attention on the wonderful things he was doing to her. She kissed and stroked him fervently everywhere she could reach, nearly as frenzied as when her libido was inflamed by _fluvus_ ; only this time it was real, her own conscious desire for him unleashed at last.

She ran her nails down the long, hard muscles along his spine and he arched and growled with pleasure, tilting his head back before her hands locked behind his neck, drawing him down to her again as she pulled herself up off the pillows to reach him for a kiss.

It was a lustful kiss this time, not gentle, not tender, urgent and hungry for both of them, devouring each other with lips and tongues and teeth. He held her firmly, his arms under her back and hands grasping her shoulders, taking his weight on his elbows so she could breathe. Her breath came in shuddering pants.

Their passion flared, their need rising to eclipse all else, wordless thoughts all focused on the sensations of their bodies moving together now urgently, forcefully. Her head back, eyes wide open and filled with pleasure and aching need, Rosalee gave a deep moan as she tensed under him.

“ _Hard_ , now…please!”

He drove himself into her, thrusting hard and fast, and her back arched. She gave a cry of release as the orgasm took her, clinging to him as her sex clenched around his cock, released and clenched again and again as the intense waves of pleasure gripped her.

Monroe kept moving inside her, stroking deep but not as fast and watching her face as she gave herself over to the long moments of ecstasy. He smiled with relief and satisfaction that she wanted and trusted him enough to completely let go like this, and he had taken her there.

When the delicious spasms faded, she lay breathless under him, still moving with him, her arms and legs wrapped around him.

“You okay?” he asked, but his knowing smile told her that he knew she was more than okay.

“ _Way_ past…okay,” she managed in panting breaths between words. “Oh, my god…I needed that.”

“Thank you….” he said, then shook his head, unable to find words.

“Thank _you_.” She reached up and kissed him deeply. “And now for you. I want to feel you come inside me.”

He groaned and bowed his head, desire inflamed, no longer anxious that he might be unable to satisfy her, or so afraid that in their mutual passion he would hurt or frighten her. Rosalee’s willingness to make herself completely vulnerable, giving herself over to his pleasuring, and now her forthright demand that he do the same with her released him to indulge his lust for her, his long suppressed hunger for her body.

“ _Tell me_ if it’s too much,” he managed, before words abandoned him again. He gathered her to him and kissed her greedily, mouth and face, behind her ear and down her neck, breathing her scent in deeply before unleashing his need, plunging hard and fast.

She rode him from beneath, urging him on with lips and hands, hips pushing up to meet him. “Yes…yes…more. Yes, take me, take me.” Her voice was low and throaty, lips close to his ear. “I want you. Give me everything. Hard, yes, like that!”

Eyes closed in fierce, mindless concentration, he saw red at her inflaming words. His thrusting became frenzied and he lost himself in her, in those final moments before his body convulsed in release. He gave a strangled cry as the pleasure surged through him, coming hot and deep inside her with several fast, final thrusts.

She held onto him and squeezed him with her cunt muscles, prolonging his climax and eliciting a long, appreciative moan from her lover as he sank to the bed over her, his head resting on her pillow. She felt his heart pounding in his chest, pressed now to her bosom, his breaths ragged and panting, his body twitching from time to time with orgasmic aftershocks. She clenched again around his cock, holding him inside her as she held him in her arms, her legs still wrapped around his thighs, and stroked his back and neck, ran her fingers through his hair and beard, claiming him as her own.

His arms closed around her and he nuzzled into her silken hair spread across the pillow. She thrilled to the touch of his lips on the curve of her neck as he kissed her with relief and gratitude.

“We did okay,” he murmured, and she gave a soft laugh, stroking his nape and shoulders.

“Wow…if that was ‘okay’, I can’t imagine the next time!”

“So, you think you might want to do this again sometime?” he teased. His lips tickled her neck and his panting breath warmed her skin.

“Oh, only as soon as we can manage, like maybe in the next hour or so? If that long….”

He chuckled into the pillow. “I’ll see what I can do. I’m not nineteen any more. On the other hand, it’s been a long time, there’s a lot of pent-up demand.”

“Ohhh yeah, I know about that.” She sought his mouth and kissed him tenderly, stroking his lips with the tip of her tongue. “When we’re ready, I can help.”

“I’ll just bet you can.” Spent for the moment, he rubbed himself side to side on her still swollen vulva, eliciting a soft, “Mmmmm,” from her before they settled in, their legs entwined, to enjoy their intimate parts touching while they relaxed together in their post orgasmic glow.

He smiled as she shifted slightly up onto her side with most of her body still under him, their faces close on the pillow and looking into each other’s eyes. Her satisfied smile was wide, her brown eyes sparkling.

“Damn, woman, you surprised me. Rosalee unleashed.” He gave a soft appreciative laugh. “What’s that old ‘Music Man’ song – _‘The sadder but wiser girl’s the girl for me’_ …”

She laughed with him and nodded on the pillow. “Of course you’d know that one, with the line, _‘I spark, and I fizz, for the lady who knows what time it is’_ …”

“It does go like that, you’re right. Maybe that’s why I remember it. Love the old classic musicals.” His smile faded for a moment. “Not that I’m saying I’m glad you’re sadder, that you ever had anything to really be sad about….”

She touched her finger to his lips to stop him. “Monroe, we wouldn’t be here together if we both weren’t sadder and wiser. It’s okay. And one thing I finally learned about lovemaking over the years was not to hold back, to ask for what I want, what I need.”

“And I can’t tell you how grateful I am for that.” He stroked her bangs back from her forehead and traced the cupid’s bow of her lips with a gentle fingertip. “It’s never easy to guess, and I don’t know yet how careful I need to be with you. This is really different for me, and I sure don’t want to mess it up.”

“Different how? No, it’s okay,” she said, when he looked aside uncomfortably. She trailed her fingertips through the dark hairs on his chest. “I’m just trying to understand. Isn’t Blutbad sex ever gentle?”

“It can be…but usually not so much. Depends on the Blutbaden involved.” He forced himself to meet her eyes again, her sweet trusting face so close to his. With difficulty he explained, “This doesn’t apply to you and me, okay? For a lot of reasons. But for most Blutbaden, traditionalists anyway, sex and blood and the hunt are so enmeshed it’s hard to separate them in our minds and impulses. That’s why I was celibate for so many years after I reformed; I just couldn’t conceive of one without the other and knew it was too dangerous to try – for a partner and for me.”

“But surely it can’t always be that way? I mean, most Blutbaden mainstream these days, right? Except maybe for, um, special occasions?”

He sighed. “Most Blutbaden can and do, yeah, and I used to.” He turned partway on his back, eyes unfocused toward the ceiling, though keeping his legs entangled with hers. What she was asking him to explain was too painful to say looking into her eyes, but he took her hand, threading his fingers between hers and stroking her palm with his thumb, needing that connection while he confessed this intimate part of his past.

“It took a long, long time and some pretty serious years of therapy for me to sort that out, it’s so against our nature. Especially when we’ve lived our nature as savagely as I had with Angelina.”

“Of course. Again, Angelina.” Rosalee said, a sharp edge to her voice. She stroked his bare chest and left her palm resting over his heart. “She really messed you up for warm and cuddly, then.”

“Let’s say she was extreme, even for Blutbaden. But damn, it was so primal, addictive, indulging our wild natures with no holding back. I wish I never had to mention her name to you again, I’m sorry; she was so horrible to you. But I don’t know how else to explain why I’m not like most others of my kind, not any more.”

“Is that what you meant by, we’re different together?”

“Yes and no…I know, that’s not helpful,” he said, as she rocked her head side to side on the pillow, brows pinched; he tried again. “We’re different species, obviously, there’s that, our physically different Wesen selves. But I’m different from most Blutbaden; I have to be.” He gave a deep regretful sigh. “After going so far off the deep end with her, I had to separate out those parts of myself that succumbed to the blood lust and keep them separate from my other feelings…and needs. That’s been a long, difficult process. And I haven’t been real sure how certain that separation is, especially since Nick blew me out of my cocoon and back into the rough and tumble of our Other world.”

“You were pretty…reserved, I guess, when I first met you. Like you weren’t used to being out and around other people all that much. Not sure what the social boundaries were.”

“What _my_ social boundaries were, to keep myself and people around me safe. But Nick kept dragging me way out of my safe zones right from the beginning.”

“Same with me, just not usually so…physical.”

“Yeah, early on he didn’t realize how dangerous it was, what he was asking of us. Still doesn’t sometimes, or forgets.”

“So even after being _wieder_ for all those years, you weren’t sure you could trust yourself…with sex, I mean.” She stroked his chest and trailed kisses lightly along his collarbone. “No wonder it’s taken us so long to get here, both of us so messed up by our pasts.”

“Yeah. I was okay being a normal Blutbad before she came along – normal being a very relative term.” He smiled at Rosalee’s knowing chuckle, but his voice took on a sardonic tone. “This will be no surprise to you, but Angelina liked it hard and rough all the time, the giving and the getting, preferably with blood and death as appetizers.”

“I’m just shocked, _shocked_ to hear that,” Rosalee said dryly, rolling her eyes. “But doesn’t that get old?”

“Not when you’re as crazy feral as we were for awhile, before I realized I was in trouble and checked into the _wieder_ program. And after all that, just when I thought I was balanced again and might safely consider looking for a girlfriend, Angelina exploded back into my life and lured me out for a midnight run. Not her fault – she was the way she was with no apology, completely unreconstructed. But chasing her through the woods – full moon, too, that sure didn’t help, triggered the whole thing over again and I lapsed. Badly. Woke up the next morning under a tree, blood all over my hands and face and in my mouth.”

He squeezed his eyes shut tightly, warding off the unwanted sensations that surged with the memory. “And at first I couldn’t remember what we’d done and what we’d killed.”

“Oh, my god.” Rosalee’s eyes widened in shock and she squeezed his hand in sympathy.

“I looked past Angelina – she was sleeping on the ground beside me, blood on her face, too, and there was…what was left of a rabbit, just some fur and bones and blood.” He shook his head on his pillow. “At least it wasn’t human. But for that one awful moment, I didn’t know. It’s pretty sad to say I was relieved when I felt rabbit fur between my teeth.”

“That’s…definitely an experience I’ve never had,” Rosalee admitted.

“And on top of that, while we were gone indulging our blood lust, that’s when Hap was murdered on my doorstep. So much for my old friend being under my protection.”

The pain and guilt radiated from him, and Rosalee turned on her side, pressing close to him and stroking his chest, trying to soothe him.

He gave a deep sigh. “Needless to say, it was back to therapy for me for a long time. The guilt over abandoning poor Hap will never go away. But I thought I’d separated blood and sex. I hadn’t, after all. Not with the right temptations.”

“Maybe you don’t blame Angelina, but I do,” Rosalee said acidly. “She was supposed to be there protecting Hap, too, her own brother!”

“Yeah. We had a nasty fight about that, and when she roared off on her bike I thought I’d never see her again…and good riddance. I’d broken it off with her all those years back for that very reason. Violent, wild, passionate, irresponsible and didn’t give a fuck about anything but what she wanted, and I’d fallen right back into it again. Because for us, it’s part of our instincts, just so damned seductive. And she really knew how to play me.”

“She wanted you back the way you were.”

“Hell, yeah, and she knew exactly how to taunt and tempt me. But I went for it. All the years of struggle and restriction, all the time alone, afraid to get too close to anyone, especially a woman – gone, in a flash. I seem to remember thinking…and believe me, there wasn’t much thought involved…just once, just one last time, run with her, make love. Well, have sex, it wasn’t love with her any more. It’d just been so long.”

Rosalee kissed his bare shoulder, three light little kisses. “I remember feeling that way when I’d been sober for awhile, the second time. It was too easy to convince myself that this person was okay for me; no one had touched me with affection for so long and I was so hungry for it.”

Reluctantly she confessed, since he’d been so brutally honest, “Sex was one of my addictions, the ways I tried to fill up the emptiness I felt inside, tried to feel worthy of love. But he was far from okay for me. He was in my sobriety support group.”

Monroe groaned, suspecting from experience with his own support group what was coming next.

“I know.” She shook her head sadly at the painful memory. “The counselors warned us, Freddy warned me, but no; we went ahead anyway, and before long we quit group and relapsed. And we didn’t kill a rabbit, we killed him. That time he couldn’t kick the Jay, and he got stabbed to death trying to mug somebody for drug money.”

“Rosalee, no!” Monroe turned on his side to face her. “You weren’t involved?”

“No, no, I was back in treatment by then. Freddy’d given me his ultimatum and I believed him this time: ‘Clean up, stay sober or you’re dead to me’. But my boyfriend wouldn’t, or couldn’t. I heard about it after I got out of rehab and went back to work again. There’s a lot of other sad, bad history there, too. So, I know about…tainted love, and regret.”

Monroe stroked her long bangs aside again and tenderly kissed her forehead, then the corners of her closed eyes, tasting the tang of salt from an escaped tear.

“So, back to us, from the deeper potholes on memory lane,” he said gently. “When we first noticed – and for me, it didn’t take long, that we were interested in each other beyond our friendship, which I cherished beyond just about anything in my life, if I seemed overly cautious and reticent about moving in that direction, this is why. And of course the whole Fuchsbauer/Blutbaden thing, not to be entertained lightly.”

“No, I had those…major qualms, too, especially about risking our friendship.” Her lovely brown eyes were focused on him again, lashes damp with unshed tears. “You were the main reason I decided to stay in Portland and keep the shop open until the trial. I desperately needed a friend, someone who cared about me even a little, especially with Freddy dead. He was my lifeline, and I was drowning. But for whatever reason, you cared – you’d put your life at risk for me, twice, and you’d only just met me.”

“Twice?”

“If the Skalengecks had come after me at Freddy’s place….”

“Oh, that. Well, even in my _wieder_ condition, I could take down a couple of drug-addled Skalengecks without any trouble.”

“Except for their guns.”

He drew a sharp breath. “Well…there is that.”

She slid her arms around him and pressed her cheek to his chest. “And before I knew it, our friendship had grown into the most important thing in my life. You helped me so much getting the shop back up and running, and we got caught up with helping Nick in all this crazy Grimm business – which was bizarre but so…oddly satisfying. I finally had people and purpose back in my life. And I looked forward so much to our daily banter and teasing and your geeky sense of humor.”

She shifted in his arms, sitting up long enough to snag the top sheet from the foot of the bed and pulling it up over them. “Sorry, I’m getting chilly.”

“I’ll keep you warm,” he said, pulling her close again and she snuggled into his embrace that became a full body hug.

“Only the parts that you’re touching,” she teased. “The rest are exposed to the elements.”

“True.” He closed his eyes again for a moment. “Here we are all cuddled up naked after finally making fantastic love together, and we’re talking about all this dark, sad stuff from our pasts. I’m sorry, that’s not where I meant to go when I was trying to explain what’s different about Blutbad sex.”

“We do tend to roam all over the map and sometimes off the edge of the earth with our conversations.”

“This one definitely fell off the edge, so let’s put a net under it and pull it back.” He stroked her flank and let his hand rest on the swell of her hip. “I just mean I’m having to learn a whole new way to love, just like I’ve had to change my whole way of living…except for the clocks.”

“Except for the clocks,” she agreed, smiling and glancing around the bedroom with its eclectic assortment of timepieces adorning the walls and every surface of the furniture. “I know we agreed way back at the picnic that we wouldn’t talk about old relationships, but sometimes we kind of have to. Like when Ian showed up at the shop with a gunshot wound and the Verrat after him.” She sighed. “But before Angelina, weren’t any of your old girlfriends into ‘gentle’?”

“Not as a steady diet. Closest was my grad school roomie. We were sort of friends-with-benefits, we knew the relationship wasn’t serious; it’d be over with graduation. But we were good for each other; started out as study buddies and pretty soon decided to move in together. We were both lonesome and nerdy and surrounded by kehrseiten classmates, no one else who understood what we are, so it just kind of unfolded naturally.”

“So she’s Blutbad,” Rosalee clarified.

“Yeah, I’ve never been with any other kind but my own…until now.” He hugged her with a smile and kissed her hair.

“She wasn’t wild and aggressive, then?”

“No, she was a business major.”

Rosalee laughed, rocking her head back on the pillow. “Those things aren’t mutually exclusive!”

Monroe chuckled. “Point taken. Wolves of Wall Street and all that. No, her people back in Minnesota were mainstreaming even more than my family, devout and peaceful Lutherans, pillars of the community. There’d never been any bloodshed in their extended family pack, not for generations, which was kind of radical to me. They hunted, sure, but just legal game and as a pack – not pairs of lovers like Angelina and me. Bronwyn was….”

His voice trailed off and he looked at Rosalee apologetically for mentioning his old girlfriend’s name, but she just smiled and nodded, encouraging him to go on.

“Bronwyn was a calming influence on me, and I was her walk on the wild side. There weren’t any collateral casualties from our relationship other than a couple of broken bed frames, torn sheets and complaints from the downstairs neighbors.”

Rosalee couldn’t help laughing out loud at that, even as she muffled it with one hand. “I’m sorry, it just – ”

He grinned, relieved. “It’s okay, I’m glad it doesn’t bother you. Except maybe it should, a little. We started out gentle, you know, stayed human and all that, but we were young and, admittedly, horny, so after awhile we got more experimental and one thing led to another. It got pretty rowdy at times, but there was never any blood involved, hers, mine or otherwise. It’s just the way we liked to roll.” He widened his eyes. “Guess whoever she married after she went home to join the family business was in for some surprises, unless she found a guy who was already into all that. Her parents would have been mortified.”

“You are _so bad_ ,” she teased, running her hand down his chest and over his toned belly to tangle in his pubic hair.

“Hey, where’re you going?” he laughed, catching her errant hand.

“Just wondering how we’re doing.”

“We – all _three_ of us, are resting and recovering, thank you very much!” He pulled her hand up, their fingers entwined, and kissed its palm. “Bronwyn was my only other real girlfriend…not counting Molly in high school. I cared desperately for Molly, but we were still kids and sex was totally out of bounds at our ages. Rural New Hampshire and traditional Blutbaden _mores_ , all that.” He shook his head sadly. “Tragic ending there. She left me senior year for a dude who was dangerously bad for her, and not Blutbad.”

“Oh, no…but Wesen?”

“Oh, yeah. I hate to even think about it. But I doubt sweet, nerdy Molly and I would’ve ever lost ourselves in the whole blood and lust thing if we’d stayed together. People in our families just didn’t. Self-control is a matter of honor, and survival. Which is not to say tempers never ran high and families never got into it with each other or outsiders, they did and they do. Let’s just say I don’t see me taking you back there at Thanksgiving to meet the family pack. They’ll just have to do without me and my much-ridiculed Tofurkey from now on.”

“A not-so-civilized ‘Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner’, then.”

“No kidding. You saw how offensive Angelina was when she invaded my house the first time I’d invited you here for dinner. I’ll never forgive her for the nasty way she treated you.” His eyes briefly flashed red at the memory. “And that was mild compared to what some of my more bigoted relatives would say, or do. So, big ‘no’ there.”

“I’m pretty feisty; I can take care of myself a lot better than most people think I can. But not against a pack of angry Blutbaden, for whatever reason.”

“You are feisty and you can be dangerous when you want to. Fang and claw, not to be fooled with,” Monroe said with admiration, stroking her hair. “But you’re even more dangerous when you’re tricky.”

“The unexpected,” she agreed. “Element of surprise, let them underestimate me. Edgar Waltz found that out the hard way, thank god. That kept me alive a lot of times on the streets and in the Jay dens when someone tried to take advantage of me.” Her eyes _woged_ in a flash of amber. “But violence and abuse is not what I want in bed…as some guys during my lost ‘party girl’ years found out to their peril.”

“Pray I’m never one of them,” Monroe said fervently. “Which brings me back again to us, and limits. Please keep telling me what you want and even more so, what you don’t. Gentle is great, it’s wonderful, but we already got pretty…vigorous tonight, more than I’d anticipated. And we’re probably going to want to try different things as we go along.”

She nodded, listening carefully. “And I’d want to kill myself if I ever hurt or scared you during sex, however unintentionally, okay?”

“Okay.” She took his hands between hers. “So we go slow, there’s no rush. We talk about everything, like we’re doing now. And it’s way too soon to even think about…the wild thing.”

“Oh, god, no!” His eyes widened at the very thought, even as lovely as he found her _woge_. “If _ever!”_

She squeezed his hands. “ _Ever_ is a long time; I’m not sure it’s even possible not to try it, long term. The curiosity and temptation could be so strong. Though, maybe it is possible to live and love without it; I mean, it’s not totally unknown for Wesen to marry kehrseiten.”

“Depends a lot on the kind of Wesen. My friend Sam’s been with his kehrseite-schlich-kennen girlfriend for years; they even bought a house together. But I have no idea if he’s ever…if they’ve ever…not the kind of thing that comes up over lunch or a couple of beers.”

“He’s Blutbad?”

“Oh, yeah. He was one of my earliest friends when I first moved to Portland. We were into the same music, craft beer, the outdoors; used to hunt together. One of the few friendships that survived my feral time and going _wieder_ after that. Sam’s the best.” Monroe looked thoughtful. “I should actually give him a call, it’s been awhile. We’ve all been busy.”

“Friends are precious, especially for those of us with so little close family. I’d do almost anything for Nick or Juliette – or you, of course.”

“You already have, so many times.” He withdrew his hands from hers and took her face between them. “And now, this.”

She smiled. “And now this.” She moved in closer, curling her arm around him and pressing her breasts to his chest, her naked body touching the length of his, and sliding her leg between his as they lay together. Her smile broadened as she pressed against his firming cock. “Ohhh, he’s awake.”

“So he is,” Monroe agreed, rubbing against her and growing hard again.

“What are we going to do about that?”

“We’ll think of something. It’s only midnight. What else do we have to do?”

“And a Grimmless night, so far.”

“So far.” He kissed her, lips lingering on hers as he added, “I think we’re good.”

“I know we’re good, and we’ll just keep getting better.”

“Practice makes perfect.”

“My thoughts exactly.” She gave him a wicked smile as she lifted the sheet and moved down to the middle of the bed. “But this time we’re starting with you, first.”

“Ummm…that’s great, _really_ great, but we need to save me for you, too.”

“I won’t make you suffer too much before I put you out of your misery,” she promised, looking at him hungrily beneath lowered lashes. “And I know exactly how I want to do that while you put me out of mine.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

Then he caught his breath and rocked his head back on the pillow as she began his delicious torment, her warm mouth closing around his swelling cock and her tongue teasing just inside the opening of his foreskin, finding and flicking his sensitive tip while her fingers gripped and stroked him, one hand gently cupping and fondling his balls.

Nearly dizzy with pleasure, he looked down to watch her wicked ministrations as she knelt at his side. He savored the view of her mouth closed snugly over his shaft, working him up and down, her breasts swaying with her rhythm, her shining brunette hair falling forward over his loins, and then admired the curve of her adorable bottom as she bent to her lusty task. He reached down to stroke and grip her round derriere, and she gave it a provocative wiggle.

He let his hand glide down the cleft between her smooth hips and probed his fingertips gently between her parted thighs, finding her hot and wet and swollen, obviously enjoying the delights she was inflicting on him. At his intimate touch, the vibrations of her moan around his cock drove him wild.

All too soon he felt the overwhelming rush of pleasure starting to build and gasped desperately, “Rosalee…!”

She looked up with a naughty grin, fingers circled tightly at the base of his shaft. “Not so fast….”

“That’s what I mean!”

“I know.” She straddled him, still gripping his engorged cock and lowered herself onto it, taking him deep inside her. She began moving on him, rocking forward and back and gripping him in her hot depths.

He reached up to hold her waist, helping support her as she rode him, her face flushed and that rosy flush spreading down her chest to her erect nipples. She rubbed and pressed her mound against his and he met her with his own thrusts from beneath, the force of their joining making the heavy wood bed frame creak.

It was all he could do to hold back until he saw her eyes glaze with pleasure; she threw her head back and cried out as she came, still thrusting back and forth on him as the orgasm took her, and he let himself go inside her with a loud, long moan, gripping her ass and moving her up and down on him while he spent in waves of blessed, delirious release.

Her legs gave out and she wilted down over him, still happily impaled on his cock until it relaxed after the last surges of his climax. He wrapped her in his arms, hugging her to his chest as they pressed their sexes together enjoying the aftermath. She rested her head on the pillow above his shoulder, nuzzling into the curve of his neck and kissing the sensitive skin along the edge of his beard.

“Okay, then, we’re two for two,” he breathed, stroking her hair. “Not bad for a first night.”

“Not bad at all.” She took his earlobe between her teeth and nibbled gently. “And it’s not over yet.”

“It’s not? Good god, woman, you’re insatiable.” He chuckled and gripped her bottom with both hands.

“I don’t know about that; I’ve just been needing you like this for a long time.” She rubbed her dripping pussy over his resting cock. “Besides, you knew the job was dangerous when you took it.”

“And I thought I was the dangerous one…”

“Danger comes in many guises.”

“Gotta say, this one’s by far my favorite.”

They laughed softly together while he stroked her back and bottom, Rosalee resting on him in something very like the child’s pose in yoga – except for being straddled over his lap. They stayed that way for a while, cuddling and petting, until she began to feel the chill on her exposed parts again.

She sat up on him and twisted around, searching for the covers. “Need to cover up, I’m getting chilly.”

“Really? I’m nice and warm,” he teased, smiling up at her. He stroked his hand down her smooth belly. “But now I’m hungry.”

“We forgot about dessert.”

“Wow, how’d that happen?” His grin broadened. “I thought _this_ was dessert.”

“Call me greedy. I want both kinds of dessert.”

“You just be as greedy as you want. I’m in.”

She rubbed her furry mound over his sex again. “We’ll see about that later.”

Sleeping together eventually did involve sleep, just not yet.

 

They got up after their second round of lovemaking to freshen up and go downstairs for a post-midnight snack. Rosalee found her camisole buried in the blue sheet tangled in the beige and gray patterned comforter they’d shoved to the foot of the bed and, after a bit of a search, her lace panties under a dresser. Monroe just pulled on his shorts and white T-shirt to wear under his plaid robe.

“Bathroom’s in there.” He pointed to its antique white door to the right of the fireplace. “I’ll go down and get things started. There’s a fresh towel and washcloth folded by the basin.” Smiling, he admitted, “Full disclosure, I put them out for you before you got here, just hoping…”

“The perfect gentleman.” She beamed at him as she moved toward the bathroom.

He hurried down to use the downstairs bathroom and, unable to resist, surreptitiously cleaned up their abandoned dinner dishes while Rosalee took her quick shower. He did not want to come downstairs with her to that kitchen mess in the morning.

When she came into the kitchen wrapped in her thick multicolored sweater, he had plated generous slices of the raspberry chocolate torte she’d brought to go with dinner and was pouring glasses of pinot noir to celebrate. She noticed, without comment, that his kitchen was now immaculate.

They huddled at the dinette table sitting close beside each other, thighs and shoulders touching, where not many hours before they’d almost let this evening pass with their love still unconsummated. They giggled and talked conspiratorially, enjoying their decadent dessert and wine in the depths of the night.

Washing their snack plates, utensils and wine glasses together before they went back up to bed took no time at all.

It was delightful to climb the stairs, arms around each other’s waists, and go back into the bedroom together. Laughing at the disarray, they put the tumbled bed back together and Monroe pretended to examine its dark wood frame for damage.

“Well, looks like it survived our first night. So far.”

Rosalee laughed as she went around to the far side of the bed and shed her thick, comfy sweater on the chair under the window where she’d folded the rest of her clothes. It had taken awhile to find her bra, he’d flung it so far off into the shadows. She’d brought her purse upstairs with them this time and left it on the floor by the bed.

Monroe slid in under the covers, still wearing his T-shirt and shorts. They both knew they needed to get some sleep, and sleeping bare would not be conducive to that. He watched contentedly as Rosalee prepared to come back to bed with him.

She took off her necklace and earrings and laid them on the bedside table with her watch. “So is this my side of the bed?”

“If you’re comfortable there. We can switch if you want.” But his watch was already laid out flat at a precise angle on the other nightstand next to the book he’d been reading; it was obvious that he was accustomed to having his stuff there. He’d been so eager to get back into bed with her, he left his pants and shirt where they’d landed on the floor in their earlier rush to undress each other. That would keep till morning.

“This side is fine.” She drew back the covers and smiled at him, standing by the bed in her camisole and undies. “It’s been forever since I actually slept with someone. And I’ve been dreaming a long time about falling asleep and waking up with you.”

“Come on in, we’ll keep each other warm. And I promise I’ll let you sleep. For awhile.”

She snuggled in against him, pulling up the covers and draping her arm across his chest. “For awhile.”

Monroe lay awake a few minutes after she fell asleep, listening to her soft regular breathing and savoring the miracle of her presence beside him.

 

The typically gray Portland morning dawned all too soon, its light filtered through the fog and glowing through his bedroom curtains. Ever a light sleeper, Monroe woke to the calls of the earliest rising birds. Without looking at any of his clocks, he knew they’d slept far past his usual 5:45 rising time, but it was still early.

Rosalee was lying on her side facing him, sleeping peacefully. It wasn’t a dream; it was real. He was gazing at her, marveling anew that this had finally happened, when her eyelids fluttered as if she could feel him watching her.

“Good morning,” he said softly, as she opened her beautiful brown eyes.

Her smile warmed him to his core. “Good morning. Here we are, at last.”

“Here we are.”

They lay there in their shared warmth under the covers, gazing at each other and smiling. Their first morning waking up together, after a night of making love.

The sweet peaceful moment was disturbed by a harsh, incessant buzzing. Monroe glanced over his shoulder at the nightstand and realized his phone was still in his pants pocket, on the floor. He reached down without looking and fished in the pile of clothing for it.

“It’s Nick.”

Face glowing, Rosalee urged in a high, hopeful voice, “Find out what happened with Juliette!”

Settling back on his pillows with the phone and a smile, his other hand resting on Rosalee’s thigh over the covers, he asked Nick, “So how’d it go last night? You didn’t come home…”

At Nick’s terse reply, Monroe startled Rosalee when he sat up abruptly, his relaxed and happy expression changed to alarm.

There was a body – they were needed at the Spice Shop right away.

There would be no lingering over a lovers’ breakfast today. As he complained to Rosalee later, “And the morning started out so well!”

‘Twas the night before zombies.

**Author's Note:**

> Please let me know what you think about the story...whether you enjoyed it,what you liked/disliked, etc. Comments, feedback and (I hope, if I've earned it) kudos make the hours of work writing these so much more satisfying and inspire me to write more.
> 
> Most of all, I hope many Grimm lovers will enjoy it as much as I did researching and writing it!


End file.
